HILDESHEIM, the capital of the above province, stands on the right bank of the Innerste, 18 miles S.E. of Hanover, with which it is connected by railway. It is a large old town, irregularly built, and surrounded by ramparts now used as public promenades. The cathedral (founded by Louis the Pious, in 818) is remarkable for its fine bronze gates of the 11th century, and paintings on glass; among its antiquities is a marble pillar supposed to have been a Saxon idol, but now surmounted by a cross. Several of the other churches are remarkable for their antiquity and monuments. The educational institutions comprise a Roman Catholic and a Lutheran college and numerous schools. It has also a lunatic, a deaf-mute, and several orphan asylums, and a large workhouse. The chief manufacture is coarse linen cloth. Pop. 14,700, of whom about one-third are Roman Catholics.